A Long Life Well Deserved

Happy 100th birthday, Sir Nicholas Winton.

Gay Marriage... Merely the MacGuffin

It was never really about gay marriage. It was just happened to be the MacGuffin. Carrie Prejean's recent slosh through the slime (released photos, medical records, called a bitch, the c-word, her parent's released divorce records, etc.) was over something much more basic, much more crude....

*****

I remember a little while back watching Craig Ferguson's late night show, and Ferguson didn't do his normal monologue. He stood before the cameras and said, No more. No more jokes about Brittney Spears.

She was shaving her head bald, going through a divorce, flashing her beaver exiting vehicles, and partying at a level that crossed from mere foolishness to dangerous self-destruction.

And it was supposedly hilarious. "That Brittney sure is dumb.... Sure is a slut.... Sure is a crazy bitch.... Sure is a has-been at 25."

Yuk yuk yuk. Hilarious stuff it all was. The pile on was severe, merciless, and in her face.

And in the midst of this, Ferguson essentially said, "Enough, this is not funny, I will no more be a part of this." (You can watch him here.) I happened to be fortunate enough to watch that original broadcast. I felt a tiny bit of shame because up to that point I had been passively cheering on all of the ugly spectacle.

*****

Man is a bullying creature. The better among us know we shouldn't, and while we have set up societal guards against it, occasionally we slip. We fall short of those standards we set for ourselves. It is our nature.

Of course, there are also those who embrace being a bully, and as always, going back to the schoolyard, they go after an easy target. And if possible, they work in packs.

In our media, there are elements that have become pretty adept at being facilitators to such bullying.

Brittney Spears became a target due to her odd fall from fame. Prejean's was an answer counter to the attitudes of a vocal number of our media elite. It cannot be emphasized enough that Prejean's off the cuff answer, in a silly environment like a beauty pageant, is the same of our current President. But Barack Obama is not an easy target. A 21-year old beauty queen is.

That answer was the MacGuffin, what allowed the process to begin, and any defenses of the treatment she received afterwards are merely rationalizations. Had Prejean managed to avoid that gay marriage question, many of the same folks taking aim at her now would instead be laughing at Lindsey Lohan for dyking it up, or the Octo-mom's severe mental issues, or whatever.

It ain't about politics. It ain't about gay marriage. Just an excuse, a rationalization, to get off berating somebody else to make you feel good about yourself.

That's what bullies do.

Sunday Mornings This Past Autumn, and Some Old Campaign Politics

This past fall, I began to attend church again in a more regular fashion. The spiritual muscle needs flexing, yet I had let it get a bit flabby. It is a Lutheran Church I attend, straddling the border between the Highlands and downtown, and inside I was able to sing those old German hymns, and listen to the Pastor preach on Christ, the Prophets, redemption, hope, sin, salvation, and grace among other common themes.

I am not the world's greatest Christian, but I am working on it. (Then again, if you ever do meet someone claiming to be a great Christian, keep a hand on your wallet.)

This is a post that has been brewing for a while, but due to my lack of enthusiasm for blogging in general, and a genuine concern of descending into hackery on this subject in particular, I have held off. But I believe ideas are now sorted properly, and passions cooled a bit, so that I can go there with honesty and respect, and not point scoring or partisanship.

My church is directly across the street from a party headquarters of the local Democratic Party. This being the election season, they of course had a fairly large poster on their fence for Barack Obama. This poster didn't say "Obama for President" or "Obama/Biden" however; it simply said "Hope," with the now familiar circular Obama logo in the O, sans the art deco portrait of our current President.

And this was odd, coming out of the dimly lit church -- after hearing of Christ on the cross, and delving into those recurrent themes of grace, salvation, forgiveness, etc., to step outside into the sunny but brisk October day to see the word "hope" associated with... a politician.

*****

I write this now because Aunt B repeats a complaint I've heard among some Obama supporters, that conservatives mock their support of Obama as Messianic or worshipful in quality. She thinks he is, in her own words, "not that bad."

I take her word at it, and acknowledge that many of Obama's supporters are similar in attitude. They voted for the guy because of basic agreements on the issues. Yet it cannot be denied that when one thinks of how Obama campaigned, two general themes come to mind: that he was the man of Change, and that he was the man of Hope.

Hope was everywhere. Ubiquitous. When you thought hope, you thought Barack Obama. You couldn't escape it.

But let me quote Psalm 118 (vs. 8-9):

It is better to have faith in the Lord than to put one's hope in man.
It is better to have faith in the Lord than to put one's hope in rulers.

(An aside: this is the same Psalm of that famous passage, This is the day which the Lord has made; we will be full of joy and delight in it.)

Such skepticisms and admonishments to place your hope and trust in God rather than in some ruler -- some man -- is a fairly strong current running throughout the Bible. That Obama campaigned in direct contradiction to this sensibility, and that many bought into it, is jarring. It does lead to questioning whether those without religion in their lives -- and liberals are more likely to be secular than conservatives -- found something to fill that void, for at least one campaign season.

This phenomenon was one that neither the campaign nor the candidate, himself a professed Christian, did anything to discourage. Though the craziness of the campaign season has now tempered, some of that residue understandably still lingers. Thus the "Barack Obama, Hallowed be Thy Name" jokes.

PS: And don't forget that creepy Yes We Can video.